Recreations and of the moral 'tone', not for England alone but for wider regions of the earth.
The roads into London have always been the crucial matter. They remain both the "question" and the cause of that question. The first parliament of the twentieth century that might have devoted all its deliberation to the internal affairs of the country opened in 1903. The first question it discussed was that of Housing in London.
The question is not merely topical to the first years of the twentieth century; it has been the sempiternal question, it will remain unsolved until London and the country begin to fall into decay. It is, in fact, the "old" question, and just as to-day the alternative to rapid transit is the erecting of tall buildings, so it was in the old days for ever. The story has been the same down to the minute details.
The Thames was for sixteen centuries the great highway of intercommunication within London walls. London streets were mere footways or bridlepaths between house-walls; when Queen Elizabeth went abroad on land she was carried in a litter by her gentlemen; there were on Thames-side 40,000 watermen, till the middle of the seventeenth century. Then suddenly:
Did jolt the streets in pomp at their desires . . .
Drawn by the pampered jades of Belgia . . .
That almost all the streets are choked outright
Whilst watermen want work.
Horse-drawn carriages had been introduced.
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